1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a profile creation method and a computer readable recording medium stored with a profile creation program.
2. Description of Related Art
In creating a printer profile for an electro-photographic printer, the printer is caused to output a color chart that includes patch images having colors corresponding to combinations of C (cyan), M (magenta), Y (yellow), and K (black). Then, colorimetry of each of the patch images is performed to correlate CMYK values of the each patch image with colorimetric values (such as L*a*b* values) thereof.
With regard to this, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2001-320592 (Patent Literature 1) discloses a technique for reducing the influence of in-plane unevenness due to a printer by causing the printer to output a color chart including a plurality of correction patch images having the same color, and, based on calorimetric results of the correction patch images, correcting calorimetric values of the other patch images. In addition, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2005-269447 (Patent Literature 2) discloses a technique for reducing the influence of calorimetric errors by calculating a level of reliability indicating a certainty of calorimetric results from a relationship with calorimetric values of adjacent plural patch images to correct a color conversion coefficient according to the level of reliability. These techniques can improve the accuracy of a printer profile created by colorimetry of patch images.
However, the techniques of Patent Literature 1 and 2 do not consider the influence of variation in colors (reproducibility) output by a printer. Colors output by a single printer slightly vary at each output time even in colors of the same CMYK values. In addition, colors output by a plurality of printers slightly vary in each printer even in colors of the same CMYK values output from the printers of the same model. The degree of such a color variation per output or per printer varies depending on the color to be output.
Accordingly, under the recent circumstances where there has been a desire to achieve higher precision color management, there has been a possibility that when a printer profile is created on the basis of one sheet of a color chart output by a printer, the created printer profile is rather inappropriate for colors varying in a large degree. When considering color variation per output and color variation per printer, it is preferable for a printer profile to reflect an average value (median value) of color variation.